


the gentle and unfamiliar

by enamuko



Series: FE Polyweek 2k17 [4]
Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Kakusei | Fire Emblem: Awakening
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-06
Updated: 2017-09-06
Packaged: 2018-12-24 16:11:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12016344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enamuko/pseuds/enamuko
Summary: Gangrel doesn't have a lot of good memories. He doesn't know a lot about being treated gently and softly and lovingly.





	the gentle and unfamiliar

**Author's Note:**

> aaaaand here's the last prompt i have done prior to the actual day!! aaaaaaaa
> 
> you might have noticed a pattern with some of my favorite polyships-- if it's got a Garbage Man, i'm Down

There’s a hand on his face. A gentle, soft hand. Not a warm hand—but then, living in a frozen hellscape probably has something to do with that.

“Gan…grel…?”

It’s dark, and he keeps his eyes closed. There’s a memory in the back of his head fighting to get free, but he squashes it in the back of his head. Whatever it is… it can stay there.

Another hand joins the first. This one is less soft, with the callouses that come from wielding a sword, and a _lot_ less gentle; this one roughly pinches his cheek.

“Gangrel, wake up.”

He groans and swats at the pinching hand while turning towards the one gently cupping his face.

“Just let me sleep, you harpy…” Well, that’s what he _tries_ to say. But between still being mostly asleep and burying his face into his pillow, even to his own ears it’s just a grumbled mess.

“Gangrel… get up…”

“Don’t worry, Emm. I’ve got this.”

There’s shifting going on around him, and in retaliation he just pulls his blankets up higher until they cover his head. Those blankets are ripped off quite quickly, however, and he’s rolled over onto his back.

A weight settles on his lower half. He doesn’t have to open his eyes to know he’s being straddled, which is only confirmed when his cheeks are pinched again, this time both at the same time.

“Gangrel. Get up already.”

He finally deigns to open his eyes, if only to give Robin a sharp glare. She looks completely unaffected by the look, probably because she’s stretching his face out—though she’d never been intimidated by him on the best of days.

“I’m awake now,” he says, though it doesn’t exactly come out clearly—especially when Robin, obviously not content with how much she can stretch his face just by pinching his cheeks—sticks her fingers in the corners of his mouth and stretches as much as she can.

“We all are,” she says. The look on her face is… less than content.

It’s still dark, which means it’s not time for them to be awake—he assumes. It’s hard to tell in Ferox, where the sun seems to rise and set as it damn well pleases. (For all he knows, it could be the middle of the afternoon.)

“You were… having a bad dream.” Emmeryn is still at his side, and she reaches over to run her hand through his hair. “You were… kicking and muttering… in your sleep.”

He leans into her touch and once again smacks Robin’s hands away. This time Robin legitimately pulls her hands away, pressing them against his chest.

“I woke you up?” he asks, turning to face Emmeryn and quite purposely ignoring Robin.

“You woke both of us up,” Robin says, drumming her hands against his chest.

“I didn’t ask you.”

“Too bad; I answered you.”

He grumbles and makes as if to push her off, but since she’s deprived him of his blankets, he leaves her there to warm him with her body heat. One of his hands does migrate to rest on her hip, since it makes such a convenient resting place.

“You were… very upset.” Emmeryn snuggles in closer to him, resting her head against his shoulder. She looks up at him with big grey eyes and he sighs.

“I really don’t remember what I was dreaming about,” he says honestly. There’s something nagging in the back of his mind, but if he refuses to acknowledge it he won’t have to deal with it.

Robin can probably hazard a guess, though. And judging by the look on her face—or what he can see of it in the dark by the moonlight—she’s got a few ideas.

“Can we just go back to sleep…?” he suggests, stifling a yawn at the end of his sentence with the hand that isn’t resting on Robin’s hip.

“You don’t have anything you want to talk about?” she asks.

“Does wanting you to get off of me so I can go back to sleep count?”

“Very funny, wise guy.” Robin snorts, but at least she _does_ climb off of him, flopping onto her side of the bed. Emmeryn molds herself to his side, her hand resting on his chest. He covers it with his own.

Robin reaches up and runs her knuckles against his cheekbone. He turns to look at her in the darkness and takes her hand with his own, pressing a kiss to those knuckles.

“Sleep well,” he says quietly into the darkness.

 

* * *

 

  _He doesn’t remember the caring touch of a mother or the gentle touch of a lover. His dreams don’t involve gentle caresses or encouraging pats on the back._

_What he does recall in that time between sunset and sunrise... being shoved into the mud and having his face ground into the dirt. Aversa’s nails scraping down his cheek in open mockery of a lover’s touch. The sweet kiss of Falchion’s blade…_

When he wakes up, it’s always a toss of the coin whether he’ll remember those dreams or not. Sometimes the images stick in his head for days; sometimes they’re gone as soon as he opens his eyes, like phantoms when the sun rises.

They disappear almost instantly this time, leaving behind only a slightly nauseated feeling in the pit of his stomach. Even that disappears quickly enough when he smells breakfast—fresh eggs, if he’s not mistaken.

He climbs out of bed, pushes his hand through his hair, and moves over to the mirror. There’s fresh (cold) water in the washbasin; he just splashes his face to wake himself up, and gives himself a half-assed face scrub to wash the crust from the corners of his eyes.

The house—if their shack can really be called that—is filled with the smell of grease and frying eggs. He licks his lips as he pokes his head out the bedroom door and into the kitchen.

“Gangrel! Good… morning…” Emmeryn smiles brightly from where she’s sitting at their rickety table with a cup of tea and a shawl wrapped around her shoulders.

“Good morning.” He moves towards the table, but Robin catches his eye; she’s standing at the stove, tending a pan of frying eggs and keeping the fire stoked. “Were those featherless little beasts finally good for something?”

“All they needed was a little tender love and care.” Robin turns to quirk an eyebrow at him as he steps up behind her and puts a hand on her shoulder as she crouches to put another log on the stove fire. “Not that you’d know anything about that.”

“Robin… be nice…” Emmeryn says sternly, but she can’t help but smile. Gangrel knows Robin doesn’t mean it; otherwise, he might be _offended_.

“If I’m not riding it or eating it, I have no patience for animals.”

“Yes, well, no eating these ones. I just got the coop set up the way they like it, _and_ Emm and I gave all of them cute names.” Robin nods authoritatively as she stands up straight and brushes soot from her hands. “And this means we can have real breakfast, instead of just porridge and salt pork.”

It’s not that they don’t have the money—dear, sweet _Chrom_ would never let his sister starve in a frozen wasteland. But for _personal_ reasons, they chose to live out in the middle of nowhere, and fresh food is hard to come by when the weather is poor, or when winter turns to spring and the roads are still mud.

“I like… Becky… the best.” Emmeryn smiles. Gangrel smiles back, but stays near the stove, since there’s more warmth in her smile than there is in the house right now.

“Becky is definitely the fluffiest of the chickens,” Robin adds with an appreciative nod. Gangrel reaches up to ruffle her hair, and she instinctively slaps his hands away.

“Now you match,” he says.

“Get away from me, you.” She sticks her tongue out at him and bumps him with her hip. He smirks as he drifts away from the stove—reluctantly, because of the heat—and sits next to Emmeryn.

He scoots his chair over so he’s closer to Emmeryn and rests his head on her shoulder. She tilts her head so it’s resting against his own and weaves her fingers into his hair, scratching gently at his scalp.

“Emmeryn, Robin’s being _mean_ to me.” He grins as he whines, though, which sort of defeats the purpose. At least it makes Emmeryn laugh, which is the important part.

“Here. Breakfast. Put your mouth to better use.” Robin sets three plates on the table, one for each of them, each with some fried strips of salt pork—probably where she got the grease for the pan.

(He feels quite proud of himself for ignoring the _obvious_ dirty joke—he’s not sure Robin feels the same. Relieved, more like.)

As he tears into the first _real_ breakfast he’s had in ages, Gangrel feels Emmeryn continue to scratch at the nape of his neck. He feels Robin’s foot tap against his own under the table. Such little, everyday signs of affection… once he would have scoffed at the thought of being so content with such things. One time he would have laughed at the idea of ever being involved in a situation like this, rather than toiling in the mid and filth like a worm like him deserved…

Those dreams he keeps having don’t mean a thing to him. So what if his brain is determined to convince him he’s not worth this? His dreams—his entire _brain_ —can go hang for all he cares.

“Are you going to finish that?” Robin asks, stabbing her fork in the direction of his eggs. He pulls his plate closer to himself and puts his arm around it protectively.

“You’ll get these eggs over my dead body,” he says, and everything feels right.


End file.
